Places Victoria
’s annual loss has surged to $192 million in the 2013 fiscal year after deep write-downs in the state developer’s property portfolio and an ill-considered broadband roll-out at its housing estates.

The dramatic deterioration followed last year’s $19 million loss, which prompted swift intervention from Planning Minister
Matthew Guy
and the appointment of a new interim head to lead a radical restructure.

The full impact of costly decisions by the state agency was brought to book in the 2013 accounts. The biggest single impact was a $94.4 million impairment on a clutch of housing projects around Melbourne and the state. Many of the sites were acquired at the top of the market.

Places Victoria had been caught short in the softening residential development market.

Previously known as VicUrban, the agency’s ambitious plan to roll out fibre broadband connections across its estates also proved costly.

In its 2013 report, Places Victoria recognised $45.4 million in costs against the project. About half of that amount was an impairment against the existing infrastructure, the rest was a provision on contracts to connect homes which remain to be completed.

The agency once boasted its broadband roll-out would provide a model for the NBN project.

But the would-be Victorian pre-cursor had been riddled with problems. In some cases the agency paid residents up to $300 a month in compensation for faulty lines.